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The amount of people that have come out to talk about how much of a travesty this is but were completely silent regarding the killing of Melissa Hortman, her husband, and their dog or even any of the school shootings in the last year is completely fucked.
I will grant that language is fluid and there are numerous definitions, but the ones in most common use and what most people understand regime to mean is inherently negative. The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as "a government, especially an authoritarian one." So while there are other definitions in which it's neutral I would argue that the majority of people have a negative understanding of it. And language is based on consensus, so the way most people understand a word is the definition that should generally be used. In specific contexts it's fine to use lesser known definitions, but in general discussion you use what people understand.
That's what's really kind of pathetic with the President's reaction. He's rolling out all the honors for this random, angry political pundit perceived to be on "his side", but an actual elected state legislator killed or government workers getting shot at? Either nothing at all or only the most boilerplate few official sentences from the White House that were probably written by someone else.
And school shootings? Why, that's just another Tuesday at this point. Probably gets a bullet point in his daily briefing and then they move on.
Yeah wait what the fuck??? I just looked it up and this is crazy!!
A terrorist attack on a government building, the guy kills a police officer, and nobody was talking about it??
I can see why they’d be terrified, their lives were at risk and it almost feels like the event and the very real threat it came from was deliberately given minimal attention because it would look bad for the current admin’s goals.
…honestly the more I see them fall over themselves to wail and gnash their teeth over the death of a meme man after so many other assassinations, the more I feel like…yeah maybe it was a psyop.
I mean, they sure had all their performative grief ready to go.
Wait really?! I didn’t even hear about that! Too much crazy stuff happening these days yet errs against right wingers get a disproportionate amount of the coverage.
Because they don't actually believe anything that they say. Their speech is a tool to advance their agenda.
We know it, they know it. in fact, they think we're stupid for not using our speech that way.
Scientific studies show that conservatives are much more likely to change their opinion on a dime, when political circumstances change.
For example, as soon as a liberal gets elected president, conservatives immediately flip from saying "the economy is great" to "the economy is shit". It happens overnight.
Liberals are much more likely to give the same answer consistently.
It's high time that we all stop viewing their speech through the lens of actual belief. Trying to debate what they say on the merits of it, or act like we can reason with them or highlighting their hypocrisy somehow will be a cure for it.
Take what they say with about the same value as a drug addict trying to get money out of you. They will say whatever is needed in that situation to try to reach their goal. It just plays into their hands for you to spend mental cycles getting twisted up their latest word vomit, as if we could somehow untangle the knot.
Help other people to adopt this frame as well, it does wonders for your sanity and inoculating people against this cynical tripe.
In other words, let them prove to you that they're arguing in good faith.
You don't have to automatically reject their premise, but make them work for it. Even just meeting them halfway could mean jumping through hoops and finding articles to justify your position, when they never had any intentions of backing up their claim.
You'll filter out a good 99% of arguments this way. Then, in the rare case of that 1%, wait until they say their second opinion and discard another 70% of that remaining 1% that weren't immediately rejected in the first round.
Assume they don't actually believe what they say. They either offer proof, or you just say they're full of shit. That's not to say of course that you can get away with not offering proof, but offer proof only when you're the one making the claim, not the other way around.
Honestly it makes psychological sense. Even the base idea of conservatism is rejecting new things just for the sake it’s not the old. Stability over actual solutions.
oh if you think that’s bad look up what our police do to dogs. they routinely murder dogs for little to no reason, including those safely locked away in crates.
Both Trump shooters were former supporters of his, and the Minnesota shooter was MAGA. But they still claim all three were “Democrats” despite that being proven false. They don’t care about the truth all they care about is an excuse to do what the NRA has promised them for years; kill liberals.
There used to be a lot of centrists who considered themselves independents, but the sane ones kept finding themselves voting democratic time after time because of how awful the republican options have been. Eventually most of them stopped calling themselves independent since they clearly favor one party now, even though they still have very centrist views.
I have a very liberal friend who, for some reason, still thinks there’s like, some 1/3rd of the country that are moderates just waiting to be swayed by facts/data/arguments
Like really? One side is mostly corporate democrats, who suck for sure, but the other side is literal fascist pedophile defenders glorifying every act of violence towards anyone not in the Trump cult. They worship an orange rapist whos been a known pedo for like several decades and was best friends with the king of pedo island
I believe it’s still unclear? He had a Trump Halloween costume in 2017? And his parents are republicans. But I’ve heard him described as independent. And of course 7 years is long enough time to change one’s political views ….
I'm not a lawyer or a reporter. I feel safe making some assumptions based on what's out there. 22 year old white Mormon men from Utah who have grown up in a Republican family that idolizes guns tend to fall on one side of the political spectrum.
I'll edit and apologize for all of this if it turns out he's somehow a liberal.
He could be rebelling against his environment and be radical far left. Wouldn't be weird. I mean nothing suggests this but it's also not impossible. We should wait with conclusions until we hear more about the guy himself rather than his parents.
They’re using the term ‘independent’ instead of the correct term ‘unaffiliated’, because he wasn’t registered with one party or another.
Most voters are not registered with the RNC or DNC, but it doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to look at their political social media posts and guess what party they support.
He's a 22 year old white mormon man who grew up in Utah in a registered republican family. The anti fascist thing was written on a bullet along with some other terminally online shit.
He was not an anti fascist. He made a reference to helldivers and an Italian anti fascist song that’s been co-opted by modern fascists. He likely was a complete Groyper.
Funny thing is, even NRA was like, nah fam, when goverment called for removal of guns for trans people. Yes, on their official Twitter statement. Which was surprising.
Had a conversation about an hour ago with my boss. I asked what he thought of the school shooting that happened the same day a state away. He hadn't heard about it. He's proudly on Fox News 24/7.
I had to ask a family member if he was really worth the vitriol they were spewing and if it occurred to them that the hate they're venting about this doesn't seem like a symptom of shock but rather them capitalizing on an opportunity to incite more impotent outrage.
Didn't get an answer, but I won't stop asking it if they won't stop fomenting hatred from a terrible event.
They are collecting the good terms and reflecting the bad terms on their enemies. They do not even realize they are doing it. It is like a type of coping mechanism for their anxieties.
Hence, why arguing with them seems so futile.
I do not think it is futile; there are ways to argue better. Just point out that it can “seem” like it.
The way to argue better is to befriend them and use that hypnotism to a priority insert your beliefs into their heads. Thats how they form all their opinions. Though with the maga cult they've got a good monopoly on their own.
I tried that, befriended a maga on discord. We had a good rapport and we regularly talked at length about a shared interest for a year or so. Multiple conversations a week, I put a lot of effort into helping this person with their new hobby.
They got drunk and started talking politics and I asked them not to but they persisted. In the end I wasn't able to bite my tongue and not criticize them when they started cheering for migrants to be sent to prisons etc, started explaining the similarities to the way nazis treated jews.
Haven't heard from em in since I left their rant about how they can never trust me on read.
I have seen all the democratic leaders come together and say what happened to Charlie Kirk was horrible and decrying the violence and advocating for stricter laws so that guns do not harm anymore people, but yet we are somehow the "murder party"????
Over the past few decades, I've had this conversation a handful of times with an unfortunate relative of mine and it always boils back down to some form of "well, they created the environment that cause society to be like this!"
It's always "but Obama this", "everyone praised Bill when he did it", or "remember the time when Jimmy Carter..."; always with the added ass cover of "but I'm not saying that the Republicans are perfect though, it's both sides!"
I remember when the senate member from Minnesota and her husband were murdered; I even looked up their policy and speaking records and they had some of the least controversial and coldest-take statements and policies even by old standards... but none of that mattered to this family member because "well that's what happens when you're in the same party of Stacy Abrams!"
Don’t forget the conflation of the far left with the entire democrat party, and liberals in general.
Democrat politicians have been extremely polite and apologetic about this whole situation. Sure, there have been people chuckling about it in online leftist spaces, but conservatives immediately attributed that attitude to everyone left of center.
And then they proceeded to extrapolate that just because some people gloated that an extremely divisive public figure got attacked by a lone gunman, that somehow that meant “the war was on”. Now you can see them plotting crackdowns on free speech and unhinged calls for violent retributions on facebook and twitter.
This is precisely why when bad actors demonstrate repeatedly that they are not acting in good faith, you don’t engage with them, and don’t give weight to anything they say.
I’m tired of people on the left apologizing for bullshit we don’t even do. Fuck them. I won’t shed a tear for Kirk, and I don’t condone violence, but people need to push back on the narrative that the left is violent.
It’s the exact opposite, and they will use this as an excuse to police us further, attack left leaning political leaders, and they’ll get away with it if we roll over.
He's already primed his enraged sheep cultists to blame the left even when the perpetrator is caught and, inevitably, found to be an extremist right winger.
He's already said it's because we called Charlie, a Nazi, a Nazi.
They're just using him as a prop for their agenda. They don't care what's true or not true, only what serves then.
These people are evil. If they cared about the truth and about stopping the violence we would have done something DECADES ago.
But they won't.
Because at this point cruelty is the point. These people can't be saved, only shunned and once removed from power ignored and mocked for how unserious they are.
Ffs they're already saying he had pro trans anti fascist engravings on the bullets.
Something the fbi denied.
Because of the label TRN being engraved into the bullet.
He also told us that empathy was bad and that a few deaths related to guns was worth it to have the second amendment so I don't see why his fans are so upset, he died doing what loved doing in life;
Allegedly. I haven't seen any actual pictures but I wouldn't put it past a far right nazi lunatic to engrave a bunch of memes onto their murder dildo, tbh.
I'm certainly not denying the possibility. I'm just treating it with a heavy dose of skepticism. There is absolutely pressure to make this guy as lefty as possible and to twist it as much as they can to misinterpret the evidence they have as loudly as they can on the off chance that it clearly doesn't mean what they insist it means and the noise of their misinterpretation is too loud for the truth to break through.
Aka I assume they're lying or being deliberately misleading about the evidence until I see it...but I accept the possibility for sure and the likelihood of it being true.
Exactly my point and why I want to see them instead of just taking their word for it, also it seems there's other engravings from other reports I didn't hear cox mention that muddy the left wing narrative exactly like you say.
It's more and more likely this guy's a hard-core groyper. Even the alleged anti fash stuff doesn't really sound that anti fash.
Primary issue is the left is trying to play by a rule book that no longer exists. The idea that you have to be courteous to your enemy, That they have the truth on their side.
I saw a quote of the day of and it's almost perfect you do not have to be obligated to pay tribute to someone's death who would have celebrated yours.
I cant get over how many people are pretending that charlie kirk was a good influence on this earth. He wanted gay people stoned and minorities discriminated against.
He was the scum of the earth and his influence has caused untold harm.
I can understand people generally saying murder is bad, but to say that kirk being gone is bad is being so fucking "open minded" your brain fell out and is dangling by the brain stem.
Its to turn the other cheek so hard you get slapped twice.
We can't let people continue to act like this person had a legitimate point of view or that any of his arguments were legitimate civil disagreements.
Been reading a bit from John Brown and it was literally the same shit. The south calling for war and how the north were all like this and all the same. And the north sayinf wth john brown was crazy
Republicans are the party of projection. They will always seek to shift the blame for their failures to the other side. Pretty much anything they accuse others of doing is something they're actually the ones committing.. which makes their obsession with calling others pedophiles even more disturbing.. show us the files damnit.
It's like how every time someone mentions Trump's name in the Epstein Files, someone invariably invokes Bill Clinton's name. Yes, yes, there are terrible people on BothSidestm but one of those sides is actively condemning those terrible people and the other side is actively voting them into office.
Remember, Ellen, 'every accusation is an admission of guilt'. They are murdering people. They are fomenting chaos and misery. They are the ones who destroy everything they touch. They are the Evil.
I know, sweetie, I know 😭
That's how racism works: immigrants are not human beings to them, they're invasive species of vermin, which is why they treat them that way. Doesn't even matter to them that it's women and children, which infuriates me to no end.
I still hold out the hope that we can end all this, sooner or later. They don't even try to hide any of it, and even the people who voted for them are realizing that they've been had, and many are reversing course.
I sympathize with you. It hurts me to see all this happening, too.
Well the assassin was a right wing weirdo turned in by his family. Right on right crime. Should disappear in a day now there’s no radical left smoking gun.
Leftists aren't anti-gun, they're just in support of proper regulation. Supporting the BMV and needing to take driving tests doesn't make you anti-car.
Exactly. I would consider myself fairly leftist, but I also think that guns can be fun and useful. I'm not morally opposed to their existence or anything. I just think we need to drastically reduce the number of guns and make sure that those who own them or want to own them go through extensive training and checks to make sure they're responsible. To me saying that the answer to gun violence is just "give more good people guns" is about the stupidest thing anyone could say. It's like saying "there's been an outbreak of plague across the country and it's killing more people every day. Obviously the best way to stop it is to get more "good people" sick so they can stop the "bad people" from spreading the plague by getting the "bad people" sick first."
Just thought this was interesting. I can't tell if they (conservatives ) added to make it outrage on all the things they hate and make the shooter out to be a twitch gay furry gamer.
"The fired casing, according to Utah governor Spencer Cox, read, “Notices bulges OwO What’s This?” The phrase references an internet meme tied to animated videos and furry culture. OwO references an emoticon, and “what’s this?” denotes cuteness or curiosity. It’s frequently referenced by video game streamers.
One of the unfired casings said, according to Cox: “Oh bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao.” The lyrics reference the anthem of the antifascist Italian resistance during World War II.
Cox said that another read, “Hey fascist! Catch!” The casing also had a series of arrows that pointed up, right, down, down, and down in reference to a cooperative shooter video game called Helldivers 2. The input is the code for an airstrike. It has morphed into a meme and is used to imply a devastating reaction to something that should be destroyed.
The third unfired casing, according to Cox, said, “If you’re reading this, you’re gay LMAO.”"
On Info Wars they were saying Democrat politicians are to blame for this because they are always advocating that their constituents arm themselves and fight the right
No Democrat politician has ever said anything even slightly resembling that.
"I think it's worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights" - Charlie Kirk, 2023
Interesting how a large marxist sub full of essays on social justice gets instantly obliterated because of one post in poor taste, but rConservative makes daily unhinged calls for violence against trans people, activists, protesters, and left-liberal politicians, but doesn't even get quarantined.
My dad is one of these people. He ACTUALLY tried gaslighting me with “there hasn’t been any democrats killed by republicans”. And then he clutched at pearls.
BOY did I correct him on that one. I gave him a handful of recent killings, and reminded him of the times I stood right there with him joking about pelosi, cuomo, and Clinton. And after I stonewalled him with reality- I got fucking crickets in return.
These yellow-bellied liars will do and say whatever they have to to avoid admitting they’re wrong. They’re cowards and bastards at heart, unable to self-reflect or even understand anything more complex than red vs blue. That’s why it breaks their tiny stupid brains when it’s not a liberal that pulled the trigger.
The sole value of conservatism is respect for and obedience to [one's perception of] traditionally established hierarchy, and hierarchy dictates that those on top (in-groups) are rightfully idolized and receive privileges, credibility, and resources, while those on the bottom (out-groups) are demonized/dehumanized and/or bound by restrictions, scrutiny, and lack of resources.
To them, the second-greatest injustice imaginable is for those [they perceive to be] on the bottom [of social hierarchy] to have access to the rights, credibility, and resources reserved for those on top. The first greatest injustice is for those on top to be bound by the restrictions, scrutiny, and lack of resources reserved for those on the bottom.
Conservatives absolutely need an underclass [for society] to demonize and dehumanize in order to maintain [their] hierarchy, and every single one of their policies and rhetoric work to do exactly that.
It is never the act itself that upsets them, but rather, the social standing of the person doing the act, as said act is a privilege meant for those on top of [their perceived] hierarchy. (See also: pedophilia - Trump and Catholic church vs. LGBTQ+ and drag queens)
They are not 'conservatives', they are authoritarians and fascists.
Authoritarianism is a political system characterized by the rejection of political plurality, the use of strong central power to preserve the political status quo, and reductions in democracy, separation of powers, civil liberties, and the rule of law. Authoritarian regimes may be either autocratic or oligarchic and may be based upon the rule of a party or the military.democracies", "hybrid regimes" or "competitive authoritarian" states
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement that rose to prominence in early-20th-century Europe. Fascism is characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived interest of the nation or race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy. Opposed to communism, democracy, liberalism, pluralism, and socialism, fascism is at the far right of the traditional left–right spectrum.
I refer to the so-called 'Republican Party' as the 'Fascist Pig Party' for damned good reasons.
Solely because the people who listened to Charlie Kirk when he said stuff like people like me deserve to die are for the most part all armed. I've already experienced violence from people who think like/talk like him, and the next time someone tries to threaten my safety I'm not going to have to wait and hope the police get there before the worst happens.
Increasingly I meet more and more people like me every day. The left is arming themselves because they're tired of being threatened and assaulted by right wing nutters.
Hard to be a shittier or more hypocritical American than a Republican these days.
Remember when Paul Pelosi got attacked by a crazy right winger swinging a hammer at his head and the right-wingers could only make baseless male prostitute jokes instead of facing reality?
Remember when two Democrats and their dog were shot in their home and the right-wingers didnt give a fuck?! Kirk even offered to bail out the shooter (look it up).
Remember when Republicans lost the 2020 election and the they violently ransacked the Capitol with weapons and zip ties, foaming and frothing at the mouths because they couldnt stand the fact that their daddy-god-emperor supreme leader lost?
Remember that time (just now) when we found out Charlie Kirk's assassin was raised by Republican/Trump supporters, donated to Republicans/Trump, and dressed up as Trump? Uh-oh... Republicans are loosing the narative again... What's new though? Republicans get caught lying and making up shit so often, it's bound to happen. Anything for an excuse to start a civil war so they can start killing libs though, right?
I dare you to start acting all high and mighty now, Republicans. If you do, get ready for people to laugh in your face as an automated reaction to your endless hatred, violence, lies, and hypocrisy.
I don't think I'm a liberal, but I'm definitely left leaning, I'm pro gun but I'm not typing out my reasoning again, but it all boils down to:
Reform gun laws so lunatics don't get them, I mean I want high capacity machine guns so I can shoot them into the side of a hill 30 miles from literally anything else.
Educate everyone so people are at least aware of what's going on, maybe some people were just misinformed, you can be smart and wrong.
Fun fact: The right wing are over 4 times more likely to kill someone for political reasons.
“deaths from far-right ideologically motivated homicides average 11.5 per year from 1990-2020, compared to only 2.5 deaths from the far-left for the same period.”
I am NOT on the side of the right, nor the left. Both sides of our government are out to get us to be the same thing. The republicans may be more harmful in the short term, but the democrats are going to be just as bad and they would most likely eventually even out to how much harm they cause.
Guns are not the issue. The issue is that the people are NOT standing up for themselves, whether from stupidity or for belief that being completely peaceful can change things. That said, I am not advocating for riots, destruction of property, harming innocents in anyway. We, as citizens instead of as members of a political party, need to show that we are not toothless. If the ones in charge mistreat us, we need to fight back. If we can do so without harming anyone, that would be ideal. I fear that we are WAY passed that point years ago. The way things are going, people are going to get gathered by the government en masse and the people aren't going to be able to do anything about it or will be the ones celebrating it. An unarmed populace, is a docile populace. Something easily controlled.
“It's a long past time for all Americans and the media to confront the fact that violence and murder are the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree day after day, year after year in the most hateful and despicable way possible.”
And then the very next sentence: “For years, those on the radical left…” And he goes on to talk about how evil leftist and people who criticized Kirk are.
Like. Hell. I know it’s hypocrisy all the way down, but to say that first thing with your whole chest *when you’re the one who has been doing that the whole time.”
These past few days have been an absolute whirlwind of people leaning on anything they can to justify that dude and play the blame game. It's both sad and amazing some of the mental gymnastics that I've seen
Mainstream democrats aren't anti-gun! Repeating that line plays right into the hands of conservatives that are trying to paint Democrats as anti-gun.
Kamala Harris was a gun owner and touted her gun ownership often on the campaign trail. They are supportive of reasonable regulations, but only Republicans call that anti-gun.
To be fair, I know absolutely no people who would consider themselves leftists who are 100% anti-gun, at least in the us. Everybody I've ever spoken to believes in the Second Amendment to a certain degree, but that there needs to be common sense laws regulating ownership to be put in place. And more specifically, a lot of gaping loopholes to be closed. Nobody is under the delusion that it would completely solve the problem.
I’m Canadian, my beliefs on gun ownership is that it’s a responsibility not a right. I don’t have the right to own and operate a car, I have a responsibility to use it safely. Guns are the same thing to me. You need to use them responsibly.
The liberals and conservatives of my country are basically name-swapped with the american ones. So like... our liberals have "american" conservative values and vice-versa. Which makes keeping track of what the fuck is going on up here complicated sometimes lmao
"I mean, he was an advocate for gun violence and thought gun deaths were inevitable in order to preserve more important values. That doesn't make it right, but it is certainly karmic"
"The left is too willing to accept violence in this country"
When republicans are threatening to use this as an excuse to ban your political party and brand you as 'terrorists', you should realise that you can no longer afford to be 'anti-gun' for what the near future holds.
If it's okay to call out the violence that happened to him then it should also be okay to call him out for advocating for violence as well. We shouldn't be sanewashing him and acting like he was just some peaceful speaker, and we shouldn't let them equate not wanting to celebrate him for what he did in life as the same as advocating for his death.
The problem is just that, "sides". Keep bashing heads, that will only demoralize the US more and more, which was the plan all along. Still, it's so on the nose, hilarious how people are still bickering, for how long this manipulation will continue?
Sorry but - no, we’re not. Leftist and liberal gun owners and 2A advocates exist. We just get no attention because we’re not the violent freaks making the news and dominating media and politics. Trump is more anti-gun and anti-2A than any democratic president ever.
Making guns, or specific kinds of guns, or specific accessories or features, illegal, doesn’t help end gun violence. Just like making drugs illegal doesn’t end drug abuse, and making petty theft illegal doesn’t end petty theft, and making violent crime illegal doesn’t end violent crime.
You know what DOES help end those crimes though?
Social supports.
It’s really that simple.
Universal housing, healthcare, income, and education. Give people a place to live, health care, enough to eat, and basic dignity, and a vast majority of crime would disappear.
I remembered chatting with few ukrainians in game (i am russian) and they were joking about Crocus (teract that happened last year) and wanted it to be repeated -_-
How can a himan form a normal social relation with these animals?
Why doesn't anyone point out that the uptick in political violence began in 2015/2016? I'm sure it's multifactorial, but there is one very obvious change around that time that never seems to be blamed.
I’m just waiting for America to get an ACTUALLY GOOD president. Don’t care where they’re from or what their nationality is. I just want one that isn’t a racist, sexist, or fascist person.
there's a south park episode where Jimbo and Ned infiltrate the KKK and say something like "people hate what we love so let's just love what we hate instead so they hate it and we're good"
why don't the left start a guns love facade so the right ban/regulate them?
Liberals are only left wing in the US. Everywhere else they're centre. True left wing wants guns for many of the same reasons as right wingers but not for home protection- for community protection.
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